FOREST OR TREE? WHICH DO YOU SEE?

Tim and I see life differently. I see a forest. He sees a tree. Neither is better or worse than the other, but they're definitely different.

I see a forest. Not only do I see that task at hand, but I see all the other circumstances that influence or are impacted by that task. I see a timeline of events and pace things accordingly. My ability to see a forest is a benefit when it comes to paying bills, scheduling things, and balancing household, school, and kid stuff. It's a burden when there's a lot going on and I get totally overwhelmed by the fact or feeling, depending on the situation, that I'll never get everything done.

Tim sees a tree. He sees a task that needs to be done and just does it. He stays focused on the job and isn't distracted by other circumstances. His ability to see a tree is a benefit when there's a lot to do because he calmly tackles one thing at a time and when decisions need to be made because he doesn't overanalyze the situation. It's a burden when other people or circumstances are negatively impacted by his failure to factor them into how or when he completed the thing he was working on.

Needless to say, our opposite tendencies have been both a blessing and a source of conflict in our home. No one likes it when I'm crying and barking at everyone because I'm stressing about how much there is to do, how little time there is to do it, and how one thing not being done right will stop the world from spinning. No one likes it when Tim can't see past the moment to consider the broader perspective of a situation. Everyone wins when I make sure the schedule allows our nappers to get adequate sleep and non-monthly bills are factored into the monthly budget. Everyone wins when Tim ignores the never ending "to do" list and just does something useful like cleaning the dirty kitchen or running a load of laundry.

What about you? Are you more of a forest or a tree person? What about the people you live or work with? How do your similarities or differences play out?

CHRISTMAS 2011

Christmas gave us the opportunity for our first road trip as a family of six. We loaded up and headed to my dad's on Christmas Eve for a quick, noisy, fun weekend with grandparents, siblings, cousins, aunts, and uncles. We chatted, ate, exchanged gifts, and passed Tyler around. The kids played games, danced, sat in the hot tub, and ran around like maniacs. Good times!

Here's the first picture we have of our family since Tyler's been born. In fact, it's the only picture of he and I or he and Tim together. Such is life when you unexpectedly spend your first few days in the hospital without a camera and your first couple weeks in a home where mom is moving slowly and dad is taking care of her and everything else. Oh well, such is life. We'll start catching up on pictures soon!



Here's the grandparents, who were also the awesome Christmas hosts, with four of their five kids, three spouses of kids, and eleven of their dozen grandkids.



And because it's our family, there's a silly picture.



My dad is doing a series of posts about the weekend with truckloads of pictures. If you want to check those out, then head over to his blog and read all the "CHRISTMAS NOTES" posts.

12/29/11 THANKFUL THURSDAY

I'm thankful for husbands who get together with their friends and take their children out for the day.

What's something that you're thankful for?

SIGNIFICANT INTRODUCTIONS

It's been a very busy week for Tyler!

Pam - I grew up with Pam's sons and she was a friend of my mom's. Now she and I are friends and she's seeing my kids grow up. She actually met Tyler at the hospital, but I didn't have a camera handy, so we snapped a picture when she brought us dinner last week.



Ashley - My step-sister made a little detour at the start of her Christmas break to come meet the youngest kid that calls (or will eventually call) her "aunt".



Tom & Linda - This is the couple I refer to as my pseudo-in laws, as Tim lived with them for a significant part of high school and they've continued to be an important part of his life. Linda and her daughter came to meet Tyler at the hospital, but there was still that pesky problem of the camera being at our house. They brought dinner over last weekend and Linda got lots of snuggles.



Linda - Tim's mom got to snuggle her newest grandchild. He was wide awake for the whole visit, which was kinda fun for her.



Greg & Lisa - Greg has been an important man in Tim's life since he and Lisa were Tim's youth group leaders. He and his family brought dinner over and spent a couple hours taking turns snuggling a very tired little baby.



This weekend the little guy will meet more grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. So fun!

12/22/11 THANKFUL THURSDAY

I'm thankful for some time alone with Naomi this morning while the male Ws were still sleeping - snuggles on my bed, watching old Tom & Jerry clips on YouTube, and fixing her hair for the day.

What's something that you're thankful for?

THINGS THAT MAKE ME HAPPY

* Church - I went on Sunday morning and it was the first time I'd been there in 3 1/2 weeks. While I've been able to ustream the services on the weeks I've stayed home, I've really missed seeing people. It was great to be there Sunday and chat with everyone!

* Cute babies - He may have a raging case of baby acne and have a tendency to cross his eyes when he's pooping, but he's still cute. Bonus for the fact he loves to snuggle!




* Dylan's The "it" Bar - A friend gave me a candy bar that I slowly ate over the course of a week. Milk chocolate, toffee, sea salt. Delicious!

* Kids who do their part - I love seeing the kids laughing and chatting as they work together, especially when they've butted heads for a significant part of the day.



* Magic dinners - It's sooooo nice to have meals just show up in the evening. Tim can, will, and does cook, but in the wake of my unexpected surgery, it's nice that he hasn't had to worry about preparing dinners. He's just been available to help me out more than I've needed with past births. So thankful for the people who have taken the time to bring food to us!

* Nipple shields - If I'd have known about them when I first started having children, then my life would have been spared oceans of tears, phenomenal amounts of pounding fists and stomping feet, incredible tension in my shoulders, a fair amount of profanity, and then a few more oceans of tears over the torture of the first couple weeks of nursing. They are essential for anyone who blisters, cracks, bleeds, and scabs. TMI? Sorry. Actually, I'm not. I seriously wish I'd known about them before last week and maybe mentioning them here will spare someone else the misery I've endured four times.

And I guess that's it for now. What makes you happy?

GORGEOUS

These pictures don't do it justice, but the bouquet that was delivered to us was absolutely beautiful, both as buds and as open roses. So pretty!

12/15/11 THANKFUL THURSDAY

I'm thankful for magic meals that show up after you have a baby. The generosity of others' time and resources is a blessing!

What's one thing that you're thankful for?

TALKIN' ABOUT TYLER

Tyler is five days old and we've been home two days. I think that means it's about time to do a post about the little guy's birth and share some pictures of him. Agreed?

Without hashing out every detail of the ordeal, I'll give a nutshell of Tyler's arrival. I started labor late on Tuesday afternoon after having a few days of early labor signs. I was dilated to a seven and my water was about to break when my midwife arrived at 8:00 that night. It looked like we'd have a speedy delivery if we just broke my water, so that's what we did.

Then we waited.

And waited.

And waited.

And realized the baby was not going to arrive on 12/6, which was my grandma's 88th birthday. She'd been hoping for a birthday baby and it would have been cool for that to happen. Oh well.

And waited.

And waited.

Contractions were irregular and weak, so I had an IV to give them a boost. They immediately kicked into gear and eventually I was pushing.

And pushing.

And pushing.

And pushing.

The problem was that he couldn't get past a bit of cervix and all our attempts to help him weren't helping.

We decided to transport to Providence Portland, which is where my midwives' favorite doctor was going to meet us, and arrived there just before 9:00 on Wednesday morning. I got an epidural so I could rest and some Pitocin to encourage productive contractions.

Contractions increased in strength and frequency, but I sill wasn't dilated enough and Tyler wasn't descending. Then his heart rate dropped.

We cut the Pitocin and started changing my position. His heart rate came back up. Not knowing whether the drop was because he couldn't handle the Pitocin or because I just needed to be in a different position, we gave it one more shot. Pitocin started again and I stayed in the position that made his heart rate return to normal.

Contractions continued to improve from where they were when I arrived, but weren't where they needed to be. And Tyler was a little crooked. And he was trying to turn posterior. And my cervix wasn't changing. And then his heart rate dropped again. And it took longer to bring back up, despite turning off the Pitocin and changing my position, though it finally did come up again.

It was time for the birth enforcement officials to evacuate my uterus!

We headed to the OR with me making a spectacle of myself. They had me on all fours, then dropping my head down as low as I could go, as that was keeping Tyler's heart rate where it needed to be. Can't picture that? It's kinda like the praying position that Muslims get into, except my butt was higher in the air. They, of course, had me covered with a blanket as I paraded down the hall, but I despise being hot and they granted my request to have my feet sticking out from the blankets. Ha! Wish I could have been a bug on the wall seeing that. A girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do!

Surgery went quickly and smoothly. In fact, the anesthesiologist would tell me each time I was going to feel pressure, but I never felt any at all. They got Tyler squared away, put me back together, handed me the surgeon's marker as a souvenir, and sent me on my way.

Tyler's birth was my first surgery of any kind and I have to say it's totally bizarre to not have any feeling from the chest down. Neither good nor bad, just odd.

Anyway, Tim stayed a couple hours and we called family members, then he headed home to our kids. They'd spent the day with Yvonne, who had come over immediately that morning when Tim called to tell her we had to transport. They had a blast and I'm pretty sure they'd be up for me getting hospitalized on a more regular basis if it meant they got a Cherry day out of the deal. So thankful for her!

Tim brought the kids to meet Tyler on Thursday. Though they all love him, Naomi wouldn't leave his side. Pretty cute ... and predictable.






The family came back again on Saturday to bring us home and we've just been hanging out ever since.

Naomi thinks this is a funny picture and asked me to include it. Big mouth, big eyes.



Peeking over Daddy's shoulder.




Sleepy boy.




Crazy hair that looks like it may be Devon-ish, starting out pretty straight and curling up down the road.



I'm doing really well. In fact, I was telling Tim last night that this has not been any harder of a recovery than my other births. The discomfort level is the same, just a change in location. Either way, I just lay around and do a whole lot of nothing in the days after delivery (actually, I've been doing a whole lot of nothing for weeks now).

Many have commented that they're sorry I ended up with a c-section and I just want to say that I'm fine with it. Totally and completely fine.

I love, love, love birthing at home. I love being tucked into my own bed at the end of the day and not being interrupted multiple times a day (and night, for that matter) by medical staff. Unless I'm having a medical problem, then I prefer not going to a hospital. Personal preference and I'm thankful for the two births that have allowed me to stay home from start to finish.

That being said, I also love, love, love medical professionals who can step in and do what needs to be done when my body or my baby's won't cooperate with the birthing process. I love nurses who will help me out with every little thing when my husband can't stick around and people who bring me whatever meal I want just minutes after I ask for it. I'm thankful for the hospital staff who have been just what I needed for my two births that ended in transports.

And that's that. I'm doing well, Tyler is cute, and the 6 Ws are happy.

I forgot to mention that my failure to give Granny a birthday baby was balanced out by the fact that Tyler was born on my niece's 10th birthday. At least I got one of them, which is pretty impressive when you consider that either date would have been the shortest pregnancy I've ever had.

MEET THE 6TH W

Well hey world. My name is Tyler Bruce. I am 9lb 8oz, born at 12:51 earlier this afternoon, and I am 22" long. I gave my mom a heck of a time with my enormous 15" round head that she was reduced to a C-section being her only option for bringing me into this world. All that aside, dang, ain't I cute! =)

You have to admit, I'm even cuter nestled tight in my warm blanket.

NOT A HOMESCHOOLING MOM

I've told a few people lately that my kids are homeschooled, but I'm not really a homeschooling mom. This year has just been hard, due to pregnancy stuff and moving, and I haven't put a fraction of the effort into school that I usually do.

Thankfully, our boys have always done a lot of their work independently, which means they're making progress without much help from me. And, thankfully, we do school all year, which means we were six weeks ahead of the game when public school started in September.

I sat down today to make sure we were still going to be able to finish this school year in mid-June and was pleasantly surprised to see that we haven't wasted as much time as I had feared. We'll definitely finish on time, will give ourselves a week of wiggle room in January as we adjust to life with the 6th W, take a week off for spring break, and still have a couple days of wiggle room each month.

I know that interrupted nights will make me tired post-baby, but I think that being physically comfortable is going to make a huge difference in my motivation to get school done. I just haven't felt like doing much the last few months and household stuff has trumped school for me. I'm looking forward to getting back in the groove of doing some of the boys' school with them, though!

But, for now, I'm not really a homeschooling mom. And that's ok. The boys are still doing well academically and life goes on.

40 WEEKS

We're heading out the door to a Christmas party, but Kore requested a picture. So, here I am at 40 weeks.



Yes, I'm actually going to the party in jammy pants. Nothing else fits comfortably and it's a casual party anyway. I figured that if I'm going to go in red jammy pants, I may as well be festive and sport a green shirt and Santa hat. It's a nice look, don't you think?

Since this is my actual due date (though due dates don't mean much) I'll also include a full belly shot. I don't think I've done any of those this time around.



Yep, I'm huge. Think I'll have a 41 week picture to show next weekend?

LAST PICTURES OF THE 5 Ws

Our realtor, Tom DeVilliers, invited us to a Christmas tree giveaway that his office was doing for their clients. So we headed out to the tree farm this afternoon, the kids picked a tree and someone else cut it for us, we all ate cookies and/or candy canes while drinking cider or hot chocolate, visited with some family members that were there, and Naomi spent a considerable amount of time shooting the breeze with Santa while sitting on his lap. That was actually kinda funny, as we've never done Santa and our kids know the scoop. She was having a ball, though, just chatting the afternoon away with him.

Anyway, I'm not in labor, but the baby will arrive in the next week-ish and there aren't any reasons to take family pictures between now and then. So we snapped a couple last pictures of the 5 Ws, both serious and silly.

12/1/11 THANKFUL THURSDAY

I'm thankful for three kids who were amazing this morning while their very pregnant mom hauled them around on various errands. Dentist appointments for two kids, both of which had excellent reports. One kid had an hour wait while the other two had appointments and two had thirty minutes of waiting, all three kept themselves quietly occupied in the waiting room. A quick stop to fill the gas tank, followed by a trip to the Franz outlet where they got the things I needed off the shelves and loaded them onto the counter. Final stop was WinCo for a bunch of groceries. They're always great there, with one kid always pushing the cart and maintaining the grocery list while the other two help get the groceries we need. Then we headed home and they unloaded everything from the van for me. Thursdays are, by far, the hardest day of our week, so I appreciate all their help even more than usual today.

What are you thankful for?